By Alkili Springs Correspondent
Another interesting week has passed us by. And like so many months of late, the most interesting news of all is the weather. Who was it said it is only a fool or a weather person who will predict the weather? Well, we are certainly not the latter and hopefully not too much of the former but still it becomes more and more clear that of late we are a land of extremes.
Last time we were out at the cabin, there was such a horrible wind blowing all night that we could not sleep. As a matter of fact we thought that the roof was going to take right off the cabin and land in Glasgow or somewhere else. That seems to be how it goes these days. That day it was 70 above and the mountains were so full of dust that distant peaks could not even be seen. Not only that but early that morning it had been down to only 15 above so the temperature made its march up rapidly.
So we thought as sleep eluded us. We remembered friends over on Clear Creek telling us that one night they had stayed at a cabin on the Clear Creek road and sleeping upstairs, knew the roof was going to blow off. It, like ours, did not.
Yes, we have had lots of wind and this and fall are really the most windy of all the Bear Paw seasons. Still, though, is it just us or is something different than in years before?
Maybe it is the way everything happens. If we have a mild winter, it is more mild than anyone can remember. If it gets hot, it is hotter than it has ever been before and lasts longer. If it starts to rain, more often than not, it will turn into a flood somewhere. With Easter just around the corner, there is little doubt in our mind that we will probably get one of those three to four foot snows any day now. It is just extreme. When the wind blows, once in a while it used to be a gentle zephyr. No more, now it is a gale. And have you ever seen so many days that the wind blows so strongly right out of the east and nothing happens at all? It used to be that a day or two of an east wind would surely brew up a heck of a storm.
And it is not just here. Folks on the west side of the Rockies complain about the wind these days when they have never before had winds much at all. However, let us hasten to add that their "terrible" winds are not much different than our gentle zephyrs.
Global warming? A hole in the ozone layer or some other thing? Or is it just one more natural cycle similar to that which has occurred since earth has been around?
Answers are not easy to get and more is the pity some of those answers are tied to ones political persuasion.
Whatever the answer we are yearning for that kinder and gentler weather in this part of the world, sort of like that weather of our youth.
And yet a neighbor was telling us just the other day (and he is about our age) was telling us how much worse the weather used to be and that when he was a child Havre and the south country had much more snow and colder weather than any in the last 10 years. So take your pick but don't predict the weather. Don't want to get branded a weatherman do you?
